Victoria Clark

The fish is only the start of the puzzles that populate Bovell's fascinating play. "Rain" is part mystery, part sci-fi tale, part domestic tragedy and more, a work that spans two countries (England and Australia) as well as eight decades, from 1959 to 2039.

If at first the play seems more murky than marvelous, don't give up. The clouds will lift, thanks to the superbly realized Lincoln Center Theater production, directed by David Cromer, and featuring a fine ensemble cast that includes Michael Siberry, Mary Beth Hurt and Victoria Clark. And the clarity that eventually shines through is enormously satisfying.

Where to begin? The play primarily is a quest for identity — a journey that begins in the stormy, nightmarish future with an eerie monologue by the riveting Siberry and then proceeds to fill in what happened in the past.

"Rain" is a story of husbands and wives, fathers and sons, mothers and daughters and one pair of young lovers. It opens and closes with all the actors at a communal dinner table, linking them in a kind of ritualistic supper that underlines their connections. Those links are reinforced by the repetition of select bits of dialogue, lines that echo down through the years.

Yet the individual stories are remarkably diverse. Some are more shocking than others, including one that centers on the discovery by a woman (a genuinely anguished Kate Blumberg) that her husband (Richard Topol) is a pedophile.

The man's banishment to Australia links even more people to the plot, including his son (Will Rogers) who goes there in search of his father and who falls in love with a young woman (Susan Pourfar) whose own family has suffered enormous grief.

Several of the characters appear as younger and older versions of themselves, and Cromer has created some striking images by having them on stage at the same time, past and present mingling in unnerving tableaux.

But there is a fluidity to the production, much of it accomplished by David Korins' spare set design, which includes heavy pieces of white fabric hanging over the stage. They look like clouds ready to burst into rain.

Bovell, an Australian playwright, is best known in New York for his "Speaking in Tongues," presented by the Roundabout Theatre Company in 2001 and from its movie version, which is called "Lantana." It's a much underappreciated look at the intricacies of infidelity, also told in a series of question marks. But with "When the Rain Stops Falling," Bovell makes mysteries that are even more provocative and even more entertaining.